Colin Davidson RUA (b.1968)

The landscape artist, genre and portrait painter Colin Davidson was born in Belfast in 1968. In 1991, he graduated with first class honours in Art and Design from the University of Ulster. Almost immediately, he began exhibiting his artwork at the Tom Caldwell Gallery in Belfast, although he didn't begin painting full-time until 2000. Solo exhibitions at the same art gallery followed in 1997, 1999, 2002 and 2004.

In Dublin, Davidson exhibits regularly at the Solomon Gallery, while in New York he has shown at Gallery Revel. To date, he has won several awards including: Communication Arts Award, California (1994), Creative Review Award (1994), the RUA Silver Medal (1997), the RUA Conor Prize (2001), and another RUA Silver Medal (2002).

Davidson's work is said to draw influence from a number of artists, including Soutine, de Kooning, Auerbach, Jack B Yeats and Matisse, while his oil painting style is characterised by thick expressive brushstrokes and a bold brightly coloured palette with heavy impasto on certain areas.

Colin Davidson's paintings are represented in a number of public, private and corporate collections including: Allied Irish Bank, Anglo Irish Bank, Boyle Civic Collection, Cobra Golf USA, Gabriel Byrne, First Trust Bank, National Self Portrait Collection of Ireland, Parliament Buildings Stormont, Senator George Mitchell, Standard Life UK and Ulster Bank.
In 1999, Davidson was commissioned to paint a portrait of the artist Basil Blackshaw RUA. He was also elected a member of the Royal Ulster Academy (RUA). Recent one-man exhibitions include: "New Works" at the Solomon Gallery, Dublin.

Source:
Online Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art

Artist Colin Davidson was born in Belfast, Ireland in 1968. Colin Davidson has become best known for his many large-scale portrait heads, virtuoso pieces of painting which combine almost photographic realism with vigorous, gestural brushwork. His list of sitters encompasses an extraordinary range of individuals and backgrounds: from poets Seamus Heaney and Michael Longley to the Queen and actor Brad Pitt. The latter painting prompted Time Magazine to have him paint Angela Merkel for their cover.

Davidson never set out to be a portrait painter. Born in Belfast, he studied at the University of Ulster and went on to make work based on aerial views of the city. Then he painted shopfronts in the city, relishing the visual complexities of reflections. One day he made a painting of a friend, musician Duke Special. Glen Hansard happened to see the work and commissioned an album cover. Another project, "Jerusalem", comprises twelve portraits making up a composite of the city's varied population. The eighteen subjects of "Silent Testimony" are all individuals impacted by the Troubles.

In 2016, in a change of tempo, Davidson made a number of nude studies. Ten of them were exhibited at the Oliver Sears Gallery as "Ten Night Paintings". Davidson's work is a characteristic blend of heightened realism and fast, gestural paint-handling.